“Well, and what are you waiting for, major? You should be with your men.”
Then, as the officer did not move, he seized him round the waist, and threw him out of the window. The watching ministers and the consul, anxious not to take the same route, laughed heartily at the jest, and went to look into the courtyard. Those of the soldiers who had landed more or less safely were picking up three comrades with broken legs. The officer was being carried off, his skull fractured.
Just as this interlude ended, the Minister for War returned, still followed by the Marquis and Natividad.
“Well?” asked Garcia, closing the window.
“The Red Ponchos,” replied the Minister, looking meaningly at his illustrious chief. “Oviedo Runtu quartered them there, and added a few soldiers to the guard. They leave to-morrow night for the Cuzco.”
“What else?” Garcia was nervously twisting his mustache.
“They know nothing of the young lady and the little boy.”
“Excellency,” burst in the Marquis, who could contain himself no longer, “you must have that house searched. I know they are in it. You cannot allow those scoundrels to go free! Your name would be tarnished for ever if you did such a thing! It would make you the accomplice of murderers!....On you depend the life of my son, the only heir of a great name which in the past has always fought for civilization, side by side with yours, and of my daughter, whom you once loved.”
The latter consideration might have had little effect on the Dictator, who did not believe in confusing love and politics, but the sentence before, appealing to his sentiments as the representative of “a great name” moved him powerfully. He turned bruskly to his Minister for War.
“But you must have seen something. I presume you searched the house?”